Category Archives: 3 Star Movies

Nerve Review

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It’s time to look at a film where the entire premise only works if you’re one of the corrupted members of today’s youth. It’s a classic game of chicken where the main characters want to be the victors. The film’s definitely not good at all, but I have to admit that it is fairly realistic. Maybe not in how the idea is implemented, but I can totally picture a lot of people playing this game if it ever came out. It’s something that people just wouldn’t be able to resist.

The film follows a girl named Vee. She is usually pretty mild mannered and timid. While her friends go out drinking and doing a lot of wild things, Vee likes to keep it real and just be a nice person. How long does that last? Not long at all. See, there’s this new game called Nerve. Essentially, you give this very shady app access to your phone and GPS location along with the ability for them to access your bank account and do all kinds of things in your name. The up side is that you can win a lot of dollars. There are two modes to Nerve, Watch and Play. Watch means that you’ll be paying them a large monthly fee, but you’ll get to take a look at people’s private lives when they stream themselves doing the dares. They are the players. So, how does playing the game work? It’s all about how much nerve you have.

Nerve will tell you to do something and there will be a reward for it. One might say to go drink a bottle of beer for 10 dollars. Another might say to vandalize a Police Car for 500. The amounts continue to get higher, but the risks increase as well and the person who does the best can become a millionaire. All of the teenagers are into it and the ones who don’t have enough nerve to play content themselves with watching instead. After Vee is embarrassed in front of the local sports hero, she decides to join the game. She wants to be one of the cool kids and if that means embarrassing herself in front of millions of people, breaking the law, and sacrificing her morals…that’s a small price to pay for getting her 5 minutes of fame and fake friends. Vee quickly starts to rise to the top of the charts, but a shady fellow shows up to start teaming up with her and this game may have higher stakes than Vee ever thought possible.

So…where to begin. The Nerve game isn’t properly explained as you’re not totally sure who is doing the dares. For example, in one scene, Vee’s friends are able to create a dare for her on the spot. Can anyone just create a dare? That would be bad for the company since they would lose a lot of money on easy dares. It seems like a lot of ordinary citizens actually work for Nerve, but how did they get in on the loop? How did nobody find out about this and are we really supposed to believe that none of the adults know what’s happening? The ending was a clever way to end the game for good since it’ll never get quite as popular again, but you will have quite a few questions as the film goes on. This isn’t one of those films where the writing is so sharp that all of your questions will be answered.

Next, the film only works because all of the characters are so unlikable. If Vee was even a semi decent main character, she never would have gotten involved with this in the first place. Accepting a dare to kiss a random stranger is already a super suspect challenge and that was one of the first ones that Vee did. Breaking the speed limit and driving blind were also ones where you have to shake your head. Not only did Vee only complete that last challenge through plot hax, but you’d just hope that someone with common sense wouldn’t accept the task.

Again, there’s also the security aspect of it all. If someone can just throw money into your bank account, aren’t you going to be a little worried about them just taking it back later? The film’s a good public service announcement to all users about why you shouldn’t download strange apps and then attach your bank account to it. It was cool to visually see how it took all of her info though. Search Engines and Social Networks do it all the time and that’s basically how I picture it.

Lets take a break from the bashing to look at Nerve’s main theme. These films typically don’t have much of a soundtrack so it was cool to see this film have such a solid tune. Even the tagline “Snitches get stitches” was fairly catchy. The scenery was also good since the heroes were usually at or around big cities and those always look good at night. My recommendation to all films is to take place in NYC, it makes the whole thing cooler.

Back to bashing. Vee’s plan may have been clever, but it made no sense anyway. I don’t see how she could have made her plan and then told the necessary parties about it in time. Throw in the fact that she also had to get past the observers and everything and this plan was simply too unreal. It was also very convenient for Vee’s best friend Tommy to be a super hacker who knew a big group of hackers who helped to save the day. The one thing that could stop the game was a hacker after all.

Tommy was all right, but you can’t help but feel like he’s losing out here. He could be at home having fun, but instead he’s just following Vee around everywhere. She even ditches him at one point so he has to download the game before tracking her down. He’s the nice guy, but it also means that everyone walks all over him. Sydney is Vee’s other friend and she definitely doesn’t seem to have the main character’s best interests at heart. She just wants to be the most popular streamer and tries to sabotage Vee’s efforts when possible. Putting her friend on the spot while she was just trying to relax at the local pizza joint was definitely not a move that you’d expect your “friend” to make. I couldn’t sympathize with Sydney and the toxic relationship that she had with Vee was pretty bad both ways. Vee also made sure to slam Sydney live in front of millions. The film tries to act as if she didn’t realize it, but she’s playing the game…everything is on stream.

Ian is the main guy in the film and he’s certainly not going to do the film any wonders either. He wants to win at all costs and that means that he needs to encourage Vee to put her life on the line and go down the dark path. He acts as the main bad influence on Vee and he has great success with corrupting her. She doesn’t really put up any resistance since she always wanted to surpass Sydney in something and this was her chance. Ian gets a sob story to try and win you over, but I wasn’t really buying it. The guy was just annoying and unlikable the whole time.

Nerve’s just one of those films that’s not really well made. The film even resorts to using fanservice as one dare involves the main characters running around in a fancy clothing store in their underwear. It makes you wonder how far people will go for money and I like to think that the security in the store should have been able to stop them. At a place this fancy, they must have guards right? Don’t expect the cops to help all that much otherwise though since they don’t dare mess with the game. While my initial hunch about one of the cops being an undercover agent never panned out, they may as well be. They don’t believe that the game exists so they don’t feel obligated to do anything about it.

Overall, This film had a lot of potential since the idea is interesting, but it just couldn’t pull it off. Its underlying message about how people will be a lot bolder and do things that they usually wouldn’t once they have the cover of anonymity is a topic that Sword Art Online tackled more effectively. Since the characters were all pretty unlikable anyway, it’s not as if the game made them that much worse. You’ll be left with a lot of questions about the game as well and the plot convenience is certainly a bit much. If you want a similar kind of conspiracy group shaping things in the background, you should read the Liar Game manga. I can’t really think of a film that’s similar to this one, so just watch the second Tron film. It has cool music like the Nerve theme throughout the film so that’s definitely one that you should check out.

Overall 3/10

Cat People Review

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It’s time for an old school horror film. The Cat People is one of those films that makes you shake your head. It was pretty good for about 90% of the film and then drops off the mountain in the closing scenes. It was so close to being a good film, but just couldn’t hang in there. It’s like they say about entering competitions. It’s not about how you start, but how you finish. It may not seem fair, but a bad 10 minutes can completely nullify a good 60 minutes. Negative moments have always had more influence than positive ones because they will just stick in your mind. That’s basically what happens here.

The film follows a lady named Irena who is approached by the flirty Oliver. Clearly this guy isn’t shallow despite going on the offensive immediately so Irena drops what she is doing and the two of them become a couple. The one problem is that Irena comes from the clan of Cat People and she is cursed with the ability to turn into a cat whenever things get past the friend zone. Oliver doesn’t buy this and slowly gets fed up with Irena. He decides to quickly get a new girlfriend before actually breaking up with Irena. He then lets her know about this after she goes through the long ordeal or curing herself. Well…it’s time for revenge!

Irena is actually a pretty good main character. She successfully fights off her impulse to destroy Alice the whole time and also prevents herself from going into the cage where the Black Panther was. She was doing it all to cure herself and become a normal person, but being back stabbed at the last second was the final straw. It was a shame, but now this forced Irena’s hand. The final bit gets rather crazy as she basically destroys herself and then the cat that she freed also dies as it is run over. The ending will just have you shaking your head. What happened to the writers?

Well, the film definitely makes Oliver as unlikable as possible. I wonder if it was intentional though because it doesn’t necessarily feel like it was, but you can’t really tell sometimes. Well, the intent doesn’t matter so much in the end though. You’re rooting for Irena to get him, but this just doesn’t happen. Oliver is too crafty and Irena is too nice for her own good. Alice certainly isn’t any good either. She goes after Oliver the whole time despite knowing that he is taken. She essentially tempts him into making the wrong call. He’s just as guilty as she is, but it doesn’t make either one of them likable in the slightest.

Judd is the psychologist who tries to cure Irena. At first he was a likable enough character. He knew what he was doing and wasn’t handling the situation all that badly. Unfortunately, he decides to go mad with power after that and decided that he wanted Irena all to himself. It doesn’t end well for him, but the whole plot was rather pointless and certainly didn’t need to be included. It’s just another moment where you have to wonder where the film was going with this.

The scenes with Irena as a cat were cool. She did a good job of really putting the fear into Alice and again, I have to give her credit for not finishing the job. Instead, she merely settled for intimidating Alice and subtly hinting what would happen if she didn’t stop playing games with Oliver. Alice ignored this in the end, but Irena still didn’t destroy her. By the end, Irena was certainly willing to, but chose to simply end it all instead of going for revenge. It’s a decision that is incredibly rare for this kind of film.

Unfortunately, we had to have that animal violence towards the end. Having the cat get run over was just pointless and I don’t think that Irena needed to have such a sad ending. Couldn’t the film have just had her go back to her village or just roamed the forest on her own? It would have been more satisfying and not quite as grim. The whole rushed plot with Judd also didn’t do any wonders for the movie. Such a shame, if the film had run its course without any of that nonsense, it could have definitely gotten a 6 or maybe even a 7 depending on what the alternate ending would have been. Still, what ifs and could haves don’t ultimately mean much. Also, another scene of animal violence had a bird die either of shock or Irena’s hands were too much like a cat’s and pricked the bird. Either way, it was another sad moment which really stopped the film’s chances of being good.

While this is sort of a creature feature film, it’s played more seriously than titles like Creature From The Black Lagoon and the old Showa Godzilla films. I think it did try its best to be a horror film. The scene where Irena stalks Alice through the shadows and Irena barely makes it to the Bus Stop is definitely a horror moment. The music cuts away and it gets eerily quiet as she slowly starts to run instead of walk. There’s a lot of tension in the air and the scene was definitely handled well. It was a fun moment and again, I thought that Alice was going to die there. The whole film’s approach would have been different had that occurred as Irena would have likely just taken everyone out. Of course, then it’d just be a generic slasher film and it probably would have been even worse.

Overall, The Cat People is a film that had promise and handled itself pretty well for a while, but then it fell down. It’s still a lot more classy than most other horror titles. Unfortunately, the film simply couldn’t keep it up and Oliver really did his best to put himself in a bad position. The ending really prevents me from recommending this film and you should probably just watch an old Scooby Doo film instead. Those films typically have good endings and you’ll still get your share of scares in the meantime. You won’t have to think about lost possibilities either or wonder why Oliver got to have a happy ending despite being such a mean character the whole time. Also, why did a lady from the lost village show up if she was just going to vanish and never appear again? She was definitely real since everyone saw her. Maybe she traveled all the way to the big city just to mock Irena. I guess I wouldn’t put it past her.

Overall 3/10

She-Wolf of London Review

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This She-Wolf film may not have a whole lot to do with the original, but that’s the fate of some unfortunate spinoffs. While this film may not be all that bad, it doesn’t do a lot of good things either. It moves by at a rather slow pace to try and build up suspense, but forgets to have an actual climax anyway. You will also have to suspend some disbelief by the end considering who the culprit here is. At the very least, this film shows that sometimes you shouldn’t overthink everything as if you were in a thriller film. Sometimes, the answer is right in front of you.

Phyllis is sort of the main character here. She is almost ready to be married to Barry, but something comes up. She believes that at night, she turns into a Werewolf and destroys people. She wakes up to find blood on her clothes, wolf hair, and stuff like that. Her aunt and her cousin try to help her get through this to an extent, but it’s not very effective. The aunt clearly doesn’t like Barry and tries to dismiss him every time while the cousin talks a little, but doesn’t do much during the film. If Barry wants some answers, then he’s going to have to break into the house and find them. The question is…can he fend off a werewolf?

Okay guys, it’s spoiler time. If you don’t want the twist to be ruined, then simply skip this paragraph. Are you ready? Are you ready? Are you really ready? Here we go…there is no Wolf in the film. The fact of the matter is, Aunt Martha is the culprit here. “Why did you say that name!!! XD” I know that this may come as a shock to you, but it is true. Martha is actually the villain here. See, she doesn’t like Barry to she decides to trick Phyllis into going insane and thinking that she is a murderer by murdering a bunch of people and setting it up so that Phyllis would look guilty. The logistics of this are a little dicey though. For starters, Phyllis must be an incredibly deep sleeper to not notice the Aunt doing all of this to her room every night. Beyond that, how does everyone get murdered by her so easily? True, she has a butter knife, but she is very old and a detective should still be able to react fast enough to stop her. At least, I’d hope that he could. She also just makes for a very boring villain. I suspect that you are watching a creature feature film to check out the monster right? The more twists we get with a fake monster in the climax, the more that the creature feature genre dies a little inside.

None of the characters are particularly likable either. Phyllis is rather weak willed and falls for every trap a little too easily. She should have probably explained the situation to Barry if she really trusted him. Together, the two of them could have done a decent job at solving this case. Instead, she tries to push him away and sulks by herself. It makes the situation a lot more complicated. Barry? He basically has no character and just shows up to let Phyllis tell him to go away. He usually listens and runs out of there only to return later and try again. The supporting characters really weren’t a whole lot of help here, but then again….who thought that they would be?

The film isn’t particularly violent or anything, but just to try and add a certain level of darkness to the background, it turns out that a kid was murdered by the old lady. Was this necessary? No. Did it help the plot? No. Did it help remind me that this is more of a B film at heart? Yes. The She-Wolf of London will just keep on reminding you that it could have been a whole lot better. I can’t picture it ever being terrific of course, but it could have been more exciting, starting with actually having a monster.

I did like the Guard Dogs though. They barked a good game and kept everyone on their toes. The other dogs around the neighborhood were also fun. I can’t remember if any died or not so I will assume that they all lived. If one did die, feel free to remove another star from this review. One of the main problems with the film is simply that the plot never really goes there. In the end, it simply isn’t very interesting and that’s a problem. The film may not be all that long, but none of the characters are sympathetic and if we’re being honest here…nothing really happens.

Overall, The She-Wolf of London is a bit of a non film. By that, I mean that most of the film takes place as Phyllis’ house and most of the drama is all in her head. It plays out a little like a slice of life film and that doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing, but then it should play it straight or add some good characters. Otherwise, the film just gets a little muddled and the actual action/horror elements to the plot didn’t really do anything for me. I’d recommend taking a pass on this film. It certainly sat on the review back burner for a while and that’s partially because it just isn’t very interesting. Whether you are watching or reviewing it, there is simply not much to say. It’s just not a winner.

Overall 3/10

Twice Told Tales Review

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Remember that time when anthologies were going to be the next big thing? Well, I can’t remember that either so no prob. Anthologies really limit the amount of success that a film can have. Think of it this way, you may manage to actually get a good story in there, but then it probably would have been even more awesome if it was longer. Alternately, you may have a bad story in here that is dragging down the good ones. There are three stories here and as expected, the second one drags the other two down. It’s fairly painful and the first story is decent while the third one is on the weak side. Bring them all together and it doesn’t exactly make for explosive results.

Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment is the first story and my favorite of the three. Carl invites Alex to celebrate his birthday. They’ve been close friends for decades and Carl is very happy to have had such a loyal friend. One day, a lightning strike opens up the tomb where his late fiance has been resting. A mystical water has kept her body preserved for decades and it has the ability to restore youth to any who drink it. Carl and Alex quickly age back to their primes and also manage to bring Sylvia back to life. The problem? It turns out that Sylvia and Alex were cheating on Carl behind his back the entire time and they decide not to be subtle about it anymore. Carl decides that one of them has to die, but will everything go according to his plan?

The story does a pretty good job of leading into the climax. It is fairly interesting from the get go and for a little while, I was pleasantly surprised that these two friends…were still friends. I had been expecting some kind of betrayal and it began to look like this wouldn’t happen once they both got young again. Of course, this all blew up when the fiance was revived. I can’t say that I was too thrilled about this. A 60+ year friendship thrown away just like that? The segment was definitely at its best before Sylvia woke up. It’s amazing how quickly the entire tone of a film can change. It still made for an interesting watch.

Rappaccini’s Daughter is the second segment in the film and this is the weak one. There is a Beatrice is a girl who is stuck in the garden because her body is very poisonous. Any contact with another person will result in death for him/her while Beatrice will be okay. Rappaccini did this because his wife cheated on him so this was his way of ensuring that Beatrice would never do the same when she grew up. Now, she would have to only pick one person and then Rappaccini would poison that guy so the two of them could be together forever. The main guy in this film was Giovanni and he isn’t too thrilled at this. Nonetheless, he gives Rappaccini the benefit of the doubt and accepts a quick drink. It naturally had a sleeping drug in it so Giovanni wakes up to find that he has been poisoned. I don’t think he thought this through.

The main problem with the film is the fact that there is a lot of animal violence in this segment. To show off Beatrice’s poison abilities, she infects several animals and we have to watch them die. It’s rather unnecessary if you ask me, but Giovanni was very slow on the uptake so he didn’t buy into it until she showed him a few times. No matter the reason, animal violence is a great way to completely doom a segment. There was no escape at this point. The ending’s also pretty bad. Giovanni decides that he’d rather die than be forced to just be with Beatrice for the rest of his life so he destroys himself by drinking a vial of anti-poison. Beatrice decides to follow suit and destroys herself with the poison so then Rappaccini destroys himself with a plant. Talk about a super dark gritty ending eh? All three of these guys met a rather untimely demise in such a short amount of time. I suppose it was inspired by Romeo and Juliet, but it was still handled rather poorly.

Finally, the third story was called House of The Seven Gables. Gerald realizes that he is one step away from being incredibly rich. All he has to do in order to claim his riches is to find the legendary treasure that was left at his family’s mansion. All of the men before him have died due to a curse and he is the last male left in the family, but that doesn’t stop him. His wife, Alice, and his sister, Hannah, are also along for the ride whether they like it or not. When Alice starts to get possessed by a ghost and starts to cheat on Gerald with a neighbor by the name of Jonathan, tensions quickly rise. Will Gerald find the treasure or is the curse simply too much for him?

This segment certainly did have the best scene in the film. Watching Gerald walk up to the treasure chest to finally get rich was pretty suspenseful. Then watching the skeleton hand slowly float towards the guy and choke him was pretty rich. The scene maybe lasts a little too long as the hand wants to end the curse properly, but the shock value was handled rather well. If you learn anything in horror films, it’s that you never want to trip when something is out to get you. It rarely ends well.

The characters were a lot more annoying here than in the other specials though. Gerald is essentially a villain from the get go. Alice proves to be a very easy person who will fall for a guy in about 15 minutes. Even if they knew each other in a past life, that doesn’t help. You can’t even like Jonathan since he is encouraging Alice to cheat on her husband. The sister wasn’t bad, but she probably should have thought a little more before threatening and insulting the villain who is holding an axe. Just food for thought, but I guess it’s a little too late for a heads up eh?

I found it interesting that all three stories involved someone getting cheated on. You really can’t trust anyone in these stories now can you? I wonder if the writers were paranoid about that kind of thing or if it was a pure coincidence. Either way, it was definitely something worth noting. In the end, none of the three stories were particularly strong and this isn’t a horror film that will end up being one of your all time favorites or anything like that. Trust me when I say that it could have certainly been a lot worse though. Story 2 not withstanding, I’ve certainly seen worse horror films and even counting that one, there are lesser titles out there.

Overall, Twice Told Tales isn’t terrible. The first special is fairly passable and the third one isn’t too bad, but the second one dooms the film as a whole. That’s the problem with anthologies, there is always that one special that is ready to bring everything else down. At the very least, this does beat most of the horror films that I’ve seen over the years. That’s some slight bragging rights I’d say. I wouldn’t really recommend it though and if you want a proper scare, you should check out Dragon Ball Evolution.

Overall 3/10

The Little Shop of Horrors Review

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Remember the Bucket of Blood? Well this film’s very similar since it is made from the same guy with just about all of the same actors and a verrrrry similar plot. It is a little better since there is no animal violence but it’s still a pretty bad film. At least this way you can say that the film lived up to its name though right? There were definitely a lot of horrors to be found here to say the least. Who knows, maybe the remake is better…maybe. Well, let’s jump on in!

Seymour is a demented murderer who never really had the courage to do anything too drastic. That changes when he grows a man eating plant and ends up feeding it a body to cover up his murder. Seymour then starts going around murdering people until he finally decides to stop. It’s too late though since the plant has leveled up and now it knows how to mind control people. Seymour’s certainly in a sticky situation now, but at least he is getting rich!

There are two detectives looking into the murders, but it is tough going since the movie takes place in a rough neighborhood where people die just about every other second. Still, they’re doing their best. One guy even lost his son, but just reminded everyone that those are the brakes when you live in the area. Everyone solemnly agrees. The shop owner knows that Seymour is destroying people, but he doesn’t want to say anything because of all the money that he is earning. See the similarities between the two films yet?

What helps Seymour realize that destroying people is wrong is getting friend zoned by the main heroine yet again. Unfortunately it is just too late at that point and will power was never Seymour’s strong suit. Once the jig is up we get a very similar chase scene to the last film and Seymour decides to destroy himself, but this time he’ll also take the plant with him. Once again the ending tries to have some humor as Seymour gets one last line of vengeance. Yeah…it’s an interesting line at the very least.

One advantage that this film has over the Bucket of Blood is the fact that the plant makes for a decently cool antagonist here. I like the fact that he’s always yelling for more food. It makes him a bit more realistic and likable even if he is very unreasonable. Having basic telepathy was also very impressive. The heroes should have tried a little harder to stop him, but I suppose that they realized how outgunned they were. After all, the plant was able to take down a robber at one point without any real effort. The guy even had a gun, but I guess he didn’t suspect that the plant could be alive. Who would right?

The best character in the film is easily the guy who likes to eat flowers. He comes out of nowhere and is another really insane character to add to the rest of the cast. The film really wanted to make everyone as insane as possible, but this guy’s gimmick actually worked really well. Whenever he’d eat a flower you couldn’t help but grin at how crazy the whole thing was. I also liked the way that he confidently walked into the store and basically acted like he owned the place. He didn’t even buy the flowers he just went in and started eating them. Now that’s what I call an unexpected action!

Meanwhile, we also had a crazy dentist guy who is psychotic and likes to make people feel pain as he drills through their mouth. No worries, Seymour destroyed him, but then he meets a pain addict and decides to pretend that he is the dentist and messes with the guy for a while. It’s a very odd scene that comes out of nowhere and it reminds you that there are no sane people in this town. No wonder everyone ends up dying every day over in that place. It must be due to only having one flower shop in the whole town. Hoe can anyone enjoy the nice fragrances that way?

Parts of the film can sound humorous as a result of how crazy this whole situation is, but in the end it tends to be more wince worthy than anything else. The film’s fairly short, but at the same time it feels like you’ve already seen it all. All of the characters are really unlikable and annoying aside from the flower eater. I suppose that Seymour’s boss isn’t all that boss though. He’s the main comic relief of the film and does a pretty good job in the role. He may be corrupt, but he gets the most one liners in the film. He consistently makes sure to hint that Seymour may not be what he seems even if nobody ever picks up on his hints. At least halfheartedly trying to Seymour is better than nothing I suppose. Seymour’s definitely lucky that he ended up being in this town with the plant. With the death count being so high, it makes it a lot easier to raise the plant in secret.

I didn’t really talk about the negatives all that much since I basically covered them in the Bucket film, but this is a separate review so I should go into it at least a little. The main problem here is naturally Seymour. He’s a terrible main character and is someone that you cannot root for. The movie tries to present him as someone who is very reluctantly murdering everyone, but I can’t buy into that. He knows what he is doing the whole time and could choose not to do so. He’s simply trying to justify the whole thing to himself and isn’t doing a great job of it. It can be pretty sad to see everyone getting murdered by the plant as well with all of the sad slurping sounds. Even a poor drunk guy isn’t spared as he steps in front of train tracks and Seymour was in the area. The problem with this film is that it just isn’t all that fun half the time and the fact that none of the main characters are likable just ends up hurting it a lot. I do appreciate the friend zone card though.

Overall, The Little Shop of Horrors is certainly an improvement over the Bucket of Blood, but I wouldn’t say that it’s a huge one. It is still a bad film, but at least the humor was a little better in this film. It is interesting how all of the characters were so reused here though. This film almost feels like an AU or remake of Bucket of Blood, but just with a slightly different plot. Regardless at least we got a talking plant who happens to be evil. I’m sure that a lot of people weren’t expecting that plot to make it to the big screen. If that’s your cup of tea and you want a lot of insane characters then go for it. If you want a cooler film, then go watch Batman V Superman. Now that one brings the hype!

Overall 3/10

Forbidden Planet Review

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It’s time to look at a second rate Star Trek film with a crew that certainly won’t impress you. This film was so much worse than I had expected it to be due to the terribly written romance that was included. So, to those that say this is Star Wars IV level, I have to shake my head this time. I don’t think I want any big remakes of this film and I’d rather they adapt The Invisible Boy again. That review’s coming soon so prepare yourself for it. On that note, here we go!

John and his friends command a spaceship and have been sent to an alien planet to look for a researcher who vanished here many years ago. They find him all right, but the rest of the crew has been mysteriously murdered. Hmmm, is it possible that there was some foul play afoot here? The researcher refuses to answer any questions, but the team of space cadets is attacked by an invisible monster at night. After a few space cadets are murdered, John decides to not focus on the issue all that much and focus on romance instead. Does this crew really stand a chance at accomplishing their mission?

The rest of the film would have gotten a decent 6/10 ranking if not for the romance so let’s start with that. The main heroine is Altaira and the problem is that she doesn’t really understand human culture. She doesn’t know what a “kiss” is, etc. The group naturally takes advantage of this and several (perhaps all. Given that the film hints at this by having her say “Why don’t you kiss me like everyone else” to the main character) of them kiss her. The film uses this as an excuse to have her bathing without a bathing suit because she doesn’t know what one is along with fairly dicey forms of attire. You’d think that John would be above all this since he’s the commander, but he decides to get in on the fun as well.

It’s a terrible romance because Altaira doesn’t really understand what she’s doing. The men are just tricking her for their own pleasure. John even admits that they haven’t seen a woman in a very long time so the crew will all dash at her. John says it as a warning, and yet…he’s no better. Altaira essentially has the maturity of a child and so, this romance was never going to work and it obliterated any chance that the film had of being good.

None of the human characters were likable either so that didn’t exactly help the film either. John is a terrible captain and none of his men seem to have any moral values. Altaira is way too naive and her father is cryptic and shady for no real reason. He doesn’t warn the space cadets about the monster until it destroys a few of the members and he didn’t even realize that messing with futuristic tech could destroy his mind. He’s supposed to be some kind of genius right?

Forbidden Planet also goes to great depths to show off its equipment at the expense of destroying the film’s pacing. The pacing completely dies for nearly an hour as the characters slowly walk from room to room looking at just about every single piece of equipment. They even take a quick ride around the complex, which takes around 15 minutes of real time just for fun. Maybe if the effects actually looked good it wouldn’t drag quite as much, but compared to films like Tron Legacy…this one can’t hold up.

The effects aren’t bad though and apparently they were terrific for its day. I don’t think it justifies the incredibly long wait time though. There’s not really a soundtrack, but you wouldn’t expect one for a very old film like this one. There is one highlight to the film that I haven’t really touched on yet. That’s the famous Robbie the Robot. Rob definitely deserves all of the praise that he gets because the character is very enjoyable and a bright spot amidst my other complaints. He has a nice blend of condescending smacktalk with subtle sarcasm to make him a rather deep character. He’s certainly not two dimensional and he’s very loyal as well. He is powerful and I would have liked to have seen him fight the monster, but that’s all right. The insults all make up for it. It’s easy to see why he would later return for other movies.

The monster was also decently cool. The invisibility trick was likely to save the budget, but we got some glimpses here and there and even a quick shot towards the end. I wish the monster could have appeared for an extended amount of time though. Regardless, it broke the barriers made of pure energy which theoretically should not be possible. Who knows, we may have found a rival for Godzilla after all. It’s a shame that this action part of the film could not have been a bit longer because it was easily the highlight of the film. I’m always up for more action after all and the laser fights reminded me of Star Trek. It was certainly made in that kind of style and had the film gone this route, it likely would have been a lot better.

Overall, A terrible romance is what ultimately doomed this film. It could be drawn out and a little boring at times, but it would have still doubled the score that it ultimately got here. The laser action scenes and the giant monster would make sure of it. Maybe throw in a twist about aliens arriving as well for extra tension. If you’re looking for a retro sci-fi film, you should just go and watch Star Wars Episode IV. If you do plan to see the film, at least you’ll have Robbie The Robot to enjoy. His presence in the film does help to elevate it to a certain degree. This isn’t the last that you’ll see of good ole Robbie though as my next review will feature another big appearance of his.

Overall 3/10

Hannah Review

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Time to look at an interesting assassin film. I was actually super confident that this film had to be R due to the atmosphere and the fact that it could get pretty intense at times so I was surprised that it netted the PG-13 rating. That’s definitely a good thing although it ultimately can’t save this film. Hannah is a film that always wanted to have a sequel based on the unexplored plot lines, but settled for being one incomplete film. Think of it as a mystery thriller.

Hannah was trained as a hunter/killer ever since she was a baby. She was raised by an experienced secret agent who taught her how to live in a harsh environment (Snowy mountains) for years. The only thing Hannah knows is that she is supposed to push a big red button when she feels ready for a new challenge. Upon pressing this button, she’ll be hunted by another assassin and only one of them may walk away from their fight. Her mentor urges her not to do this, but Hannah does anyway. So begins a deadly game of cat and mouse as the mentor leaves to fight his battles while Hannah meets up with a nice (heh) family who help her realize how much fun life can be. The only tricky part is that the assassins (Multiple ones now? Doesn’t seem fair anymore….) don’t care about collateral damage.

First off, I’d like to say that a born assassin is always a great concept. This character naturally learned a very skewed version of morality and won’t really comprehend the difference between good and evil. Not for quite a while at least and possibly never if the assassin never talks with the targets. Street Fighter’s Cammy had an origin like this although it was never delved into and we’ve seen it with many other characters. The problem is, it’s incredibly difficult to utilize this plot without falling into the trap of super violence or the “Starfire issue” which has the character act way too ignorant of non combat related things. I’m sure that a well trained assassin will know a lot about daily happenings since it is necessary for the job. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this concept played out exactly as I would like it too, but it’s very hard to perfectly adapt something from my head canon as opposed to what is happening on screen.

This film takes a nice shot at the concept, but they do make Hannah very naive. She is a kid though and a lot younger than most assassins would be so it’s a little more excusable. That doesn’t make the scenes any more enjoyable though and I probably could have done without most of the scenes with the family. The parents got a lot of good one liners and burns in, but they really just held Hannah back most of the time. Hannah’s friend was very annoying as well since she could have handled Hannah’s secret a lot better rather than simply running off to get captured or put Hannah in a bad spot. The friend was supposed to be tough right?

This is also one of those films where you’ll probably feel bad for most of the background characters. Essentially, just meeting Hannah is a death sentence since her opponents will quickly find and neutralize you. After all, the characters know too much. It’s a shame to be in their shoes and it is why you should always know how to fight if you’re dealing in that kind of business.

The best character is easily Hannah’s mentor, Erik. He’s a very well trained fighter and it’s easy to see that he is more skilled than the other people who are after him. He successfully evaded them for years after all and it is only due to Hannah that they found out at all. He consistently gets the better of them the whole time and seems to be on the ball. He was involved with the super soldier experiments, but seems to definitely have more heart than the other members. The main villain is certainly not in the same boat. She cannot decide if she wants to destroy Hannah or simply capture her for more experimentation and she can’t fight at all. She talks tough from behind a glass screen, but once the action dials up she is quickly overwhelmed.

As for Hannah herself, she is a decent character I suppose, but not too likable. Again, if she knew more about Earth customs and such, I think she would have been much better. As it is, at least she can fight even if it can be a bit of a stretch to see her taking on adult agents. Just think of it like Robin beating crooks back in the day even though he was a little kid. A little stretch of the imagination isn’t all that bad.

Unfortunately, the film does fall into the classic animal violence trap for no reason. Even worse, this occurs at the very beginning as a Deer is shot with an arrow and then shot with a gun just to hurt the film’s chances of being good even more. It’s debatable as to whether it’s worse to start or finish with animal violence. If you start with it, I’m going to be in a sour mood for the rest of the film as it’s not easy to forget. If it’s at the end, then at least I could have maybe enjoyed it for a while until it happened to which the film would crash. Same effect in the end, but I had more time to enjoy it. Either way, this started the film off on a verrrry bad note that it most certainly could not recover from.

The film’s fairly violent even without that though. It’s not quite as extreme as some other thrillers/horror films that I”ve seen, but it can still be a bit much. Films can certainly have menacing villains and cool action scenes without resorting to this. Just look at Final Fantasy VII Advent Children or Man of Steel if you want a live action film example. Again, this usually comes hand in hand with the born assassin concept though.

Luckily, the soundtrack is incredibly good so you’ll really have a pleasing experience audially at the very least. Most of the themes are all really cool futuristic techno esque pieces, which is something that fits very well for this concept as well. In particular, you’ll think of the tunnel scene near the beginning of the film, which actually worked as a great environment. It would have been great if Hannah could have stayed in the base for the whole film. The locale would have been a big improvement and it definitely would have had a Resident Evil vibe to it. Hey, if the film wasn’t going to get a high score by that point, it may as well go for being more engaging. Resident Evil films are nothing if not engaging.

A lot of storylines are not wrapped up by the end so there is plenty of room for a sequel. Just about all of the backstory and reasoning behind the fights in the film are shrouded in mystery so you can choose to come up with your own answers. I don’t think a sequel will be coming out after all and it’s possibly for the best. That being said, a good 10 year time skip with a new assassin as a rival could make for a riveting film provided that it was handled perfectly. There’s a better chance of Transformers 5 actually getting a 6/10 though.

Overall, Hannah wasn’t exactly a winner, but it certainly could have been worse. I was definitely shocked to see the soundtrack. I still love the basic premise as well and you can easily just zone out of the film and imagine how the film should have gone. I don’t really have that luxury while reviewing of course, but in my head canon I’ll sneak in a quick “Sorry writers, but x should have happened to y in place of a, etc, etc) Nobody can write a better film for me than me after all. If you like the concept and are prepared for an intense film then this should be right up your ally. The subplot with Eric even plays out like a James Bond/Bourne type adventure as well so action is never lacking. If you want a better action film though, just check out Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol.

Overall 3/10

The Age of Adaline Review

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It’s time to look at a romance/drama film that came out a while ago. The film actually got a lot of promotion and you would see the posters everywhere. I never got to see a trailer for the movie, but I can’t say that the posters really intrigued me. Upon viewing the film, I can confirm that my suspicions were basically right on the mark. This film could have been a whole lot better, but fell into some rather large mistakes along the way. This is why romance and drama are two genres that need to stay far away from each other unless they are handled very delicately. Don’t forget though, this is apparently an epic as well!

Adaline used to live a normal life. It may not have been perfect, but she had a family and a nice car. Well, her husband couldn’t quite make it as he died early and Adaline took an unwise drive through the forest when she fell in a ditch and drowned, also being zapped by lightning afterward. If you’ve watched shows like Dragon Ball Z or Prince of Tennis, then you know that this kind of thing isn’t fatal. The lightning actually helps revive Adaline and stops the time within her body so that she is now immortal. The film tries to play this off as actually being possible, but the reasoning is so fake that you just feel like laughing at the super serious/almost condescending narrator. Now that she is immortal…what will Adaline do with her life?

She originally decides to just live alone with her dog while avoiding the government. Her daughter is around 60 by now so they visit each other discreetly at times, but Adaline forgot to take up a hobby. That probably would have made being immortal a little more bearable. She could have started a website or something and fans could wonder how she had it for 160 years. She would never tell anyone that she owned it of course. Her life changes forever when a rich book reader shows up and decides that he wants to be with her. He flirts and flirts until Adaline decides to give him a date and the full hollywood treatment.

Again, this is why many romances in films are just so bad. First of all, it sends the wrong message. Adaline flat out denies Ellis (the guy) multiple times, but he doesn’t take no for an answer. He follows her to her job, blackmails her as he would take back his donation from her library if she didn’t go out with him, and also finds out her home address from her co-workers (Who should really know better than to be handing these things out) Finally, she does go out with him and a day or two later, they’re already in bed. That’s basically the definition of a poor romance. You know what’s a much better one? Cinderella. It may not have a whole lot of personality at times and it may be a pairing that we’ve seen over and over again, but she was modest and the romance develops at a much better pace over there. In Adaline, it’s the modern version that just doesn’t work.

Ellis is a terrible character, I definitely did not like him at all. Adaline was decent for the most part, but the Ellis plot dragged her down and she breaks down a few times, which really weakens her character. She takes the being immortal condition as a cup being half empty when she should have just taken it in stride. Who wouldn’t want to be immortal? (Actually, I wouldn’t want that ability on Earth, but that’s besides the point) There aren’t a whole lot of supporting characters although Ellis’ dad gets a fairly big role as we find out that he used to be close to Adaline. Adaline should have taken more precautions to make sure that she wasn’t recognized, but I suppose that it was tricky. Either way, it also makes Adaline look dicey once again as she flirted with another person for so long. It may have been like 50-60 years ago, but that’s still a bit much.

One thing that really hurt the film was the animal violence that occurred at one point. It was just senseless violence that shouldn’t have been included in the film, but was kept in for shock value and that emotional roller coaster. The dog’s liver or his ribs was failing so Adaline put him down. That’s the kind of plot that was simply unnecessary and I would have preferred for the dog to not even appear if it was all going to end like that. Poor move by the film.

Age of Adaline really should have focused more on the immortal plot. The government who was trying to catch Adaline was a fairly interesting storyline although I wouldn’t want to see any actual experimentation. Just the chase and seeing Adaline evade them for a while would have been neat. All of the fake science talk was interesting in a parody sort of way and I wouldn’t have minded more of that. This film could have easily been a mystery thriller instead of a romance drama. It’s all in how the film chooses the handle the plot.

The problem with the romance has already been explained and the drama doesn’t work as the characters take everything too seriously. Get ready for a lot of crying over just about everything and it gets to be a bit much. You’ll probably also see the ending coming a mile away for the picture perfect ending for Adaline. Without the twist, it may have been more of an epic way to end things. I certainly would have liked that and then we could have had an action sequel.

As for the writing, I’m afraid that it’s not so good. It’s not terrible, there will just be a line once in a while that will make you wince, like Ellis’ sister, who comes out of nowhere with her bad one liners. Ellis’ dad also wasn’t that great as he just created a lot of tension for the lolz and the film should have shown that he had totally moved past his old flame. The memories should have been ancient history for him.

Overall, this sounds like a pretty negative review right? Well, it is to an extent. The film just makes too many mistakes for me like the rushed romance or the animal violence. I can’t say that any of the characters are really likable although the blind lady from near the beginning wasn’t bad. I would have liked to have seen Adaline just living through the decades with a few people finding out about her here and there. That would have been soooo much more interesting. If the film played up the drama and emotional moments a little less, it would have been a much better film. If you’re looking for a good romance/drama, check out Tsubasa Spring Thunder. It gets very emotional while also being epic.

Overall 3/10

Harper Review

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It’s time to look at an oldish film from the 1960’s. It’s pretty old, but not old enough in the sense that it makes some modern mistakes. The film is also a little too long and drags out quite a bit. While the ending is decently good to an extent, you’ll find yourself struggling to find any likable characters in this film, which makes it difficult to be invested in the plot.

Harper is a private detective and a very good one at that. (Or so he thinks) He is hired because a man has disappeared so his wife wants Harper to track him down. This won’t be easy as the guy may not have been on the up and up with the law. The lady wants to find out who her husband has been cheating on with as well, but little does Harper know that things might be a little more serious than that. So begins his wild goose chase across the state.

See, the main plot is derailed for quite a while, as various other plot lines come up. Technically, Harper is on the trail the whole time, but the film moves at a snail’s pace. We slowly meet the supporting cast like the daughter, Harper’s old friend, and a guy who likes to hang out at the Beach. As mentioned before, none of these characters are very likable at all. Harper’s the kind of guy who acts like he’s not interested in women with all of his tough talk, but he still takes time to stare at the daughter when they first meet near the swimming pool and he basically acts like the kind of guy that you wouldn’t want to be around.

That’s not even mentioning the fact that Harper isn’t even a very good detective. He talks tough, but is constantly knocked out whenever things get dangerous. For example, he walked into a bar and started threatening one of the characters so he didn’t notice the bouncer sneak up behind him for a quick haymaker. He was then too dazed to do anything during the fight so he was quickly wrecked. This happened again in the final minutes of the film as he enters the villain base and figures that nobody was home. Well…he was wrong! Harper definitely comes across as a rookie at times.

The daughter was a pretty terrible character as almost all of her lines were just for flirting purposes. Her character lacked any real depth and she really had no bearing on the plot. Despite Bacall being a rather big name, she really had a very small role in the film and didn’t get to do anything. Harper’s friend wasn’t cool either and he was attracted to someone who was way younger than him. That’s certainly not a great way to start off his character arc and the ending doesn’t make him look any better either. Finally, the swimming guy doesn’t mind leading the daughter on even though he’s no attracted to her. He’s definitely not a good person. We also have a former star who gained weight. Her role was larger than I would have thought, but she definitely didn’t help the cast.

The daughter’s extended dance scenes at the Beach and the completely unnecessary romances in the film didn’t help its case either. The film was certainly trying to go for that James Bond feel as you can tell from the posters and it didn’t go over so well. Not to mention that there’s a random scene near the end where the villains torture someone for information using a cigarette. It came out of nowhere and Harper naturally couldn’t be bothered to come to the victim’s aid. He naturally waited until the ordeal was over because he’s no hero.

As mentioned earlier, the plot isn’t very interesting either and the story could have been told in half of the time. An example of a subplot that could have been cut out was where he pretended to be a guy from Texas who fell in love with the old actress. The scene went on for quite a while and while she ended up being important in the end, the scene could have been greatly shortened or removed from the movie altogether.

For positives, well, the writing was solid. Naturally, you wouldn’t expect to find a whole lot of language here and there was none. Such is the beauty of the old classics. The witty banter goes between the characters easily although it’s still not as good as the average classic film thanks to the daughter and the fact that her lines simply aren’t good.

Another positive would be the ending, which was certainly original and not what I had expected. It essentially leaves the decision to the viewer as you decide what happens from here. I certainly know what my guess is. The guy in the car will shoot and the other one will yell for help so one of them dies and the other is arrested. That sounds like a fair tradeoff to me although Harper still didn’t look so good right up until the very end. The fact of the matter is, he doesn’t know if he is going to bring a murderer to justice. No matter who the person is, murder is murder and it’s not like it was in self defense. The guy shot someone who was already helpless and on the ground…he should get no sympathy from Harper.

The car chase scene was decent although you can certainly tell that they don’t make cars the way that they used too. One car breaks down from going down a very small hill. A current car would have just kept on going and going. It’s a neat contrast although it certainly wasn’t intended as such. I’m always up for a chase and since there weren’t any real fight scenes to be found here…it’ll have to do.

Overall, Harper was not exactly a winner in my book. It succeeded in its attempts to be like a James Bond film as it fell into all of those pitfalls. The romance, the dragged out feeling of the movie, the unlikable characters, the unprofessional main character, etc. The film had it all and that just wasn’t a good thing. I’ll give it props for the ending, but that’s about all that I can give the film at the moment. If you want a good classic film, check out Godzilla or the old Superman and the Mole Men movie. Those are classics and have aged quite well. I can’t say that this one has.

Overall 3/10

Olympus Has Fallen Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version. All thoughts below should be addressed as such and a review of the unedited version would likely be a lot harsher.

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Time to look at a film which is in a tricky genre. I’ve seen a film or two like this before where it’s essentially about terrorists and what would happen when they take an area over. It’s not a genre that I’m crazy about because it usually revolves around all of the good guys looking like rank amateurs while the terrorists can suddenly shoot as well as Ann Oakley. Unfortunately, America looks even worse than I had feared and it does certainly hurt this film. The movie had potential, but you simply do not mess with the USA!

It’s an average day in the White House when terrorists storm the lawn. They had a guy on the inside who handled all of the “professional” agents around the President. Meanwhile, America must have been sleeping on the job because we only have 2 planes near the White House and they were both wrecked by the villain’s ship. One plane took down 2 and the terrorist plane was really large and clunky. America also had the better position since we were flanking both sides, but decided not to do anything. We didn’t have much protection or backup nearby either so the White House fell in 13 minutes. It’s up to one ex secret service member to take back the White House!

If you’ve seen one Terrorist film, then you’ve seen them all. By that, I mean that you can easily predict exactly what is about to happen before it ever occurs. The villain starts to kill off everyone one by one and they are forced to think about complying with the terrorist demands. Scratch that, they do comply with the demands and America looks really bad the entire time. Whyyyyyyyyyyy? I like to think that it’s just because the other countries want to see America looking weak as an ego boost. In the real world, we typically end wars as soon as they begin so this is their way to laugh it up a little. How these movies make it into theaters when they are essentially anti war propaganda against the US is beyond me.

Let’s quickly look at why America looked so bad. For starters, let’s go back to the plane scene. The heroes keep telling the mysterious plane to turn back or they will fire. They wait until the other plane is essentially within firing range and the terrorists quickly start shooting. The planes are so shocked that they go down almost instantly. It’s one of those facepalm moments. Another wince worthy scene is when random joes throw smoke bombs onto the lawn and quickly storm it. The pros can’t hit them so they are quickly overwhelmed and it’ll make you want to turn the film off for a few minutes to go make dinner or take a walk to forget about how sad that was.

Finally, The President decides to invite the Korean ambassador into the safe room during the terrorist attack. It’s really fishy that the attack happened during the visit right? Why on Earth would the President do this? Being nice is one thing, but his agents would never allow that to happen. It’s extremely plot convenient though and all of the President’s right hand men and women are there with him so now the villains can get everyone all at once. What a plan!

Oh boy, that was enough to drive me out of the film. It’s also just not fun to see the terrorists having their way with the heroes the whole time. Why give them ideas in the real world? These plans would certainly not work, but just making them look smart and tough isn’t a good thing. Making them look unsure of what to do and constantly on the defensive would have been more satisfying.

Even ignoring how America looked, the film is fairly generic. It plays out exactly how you would expect. The terrorists start killing the hostages one by one until the hero can get there and he manages to save a few of them before saving the President. Scratch that, just about all of them ended up getting blown up in one of the big twists so the body count is quite high. The main character ends up destroying the villains on his one man killing spree as he proves that he is stronger than the rest of the White House staff put together.

On the bright side, Mike Banning is a good character and easily the best part of the film. He had to make a tough decision at the beginning of the film, but he didn’t freeze up and you can’t fault him for what he did. He did what he could and would have saved everyone if he had the time. Once the White House was in trouble, he selflessly jumped into the White House to take out all of the terrorists. He really knows his way around the place to the point where I’d say that you have to suspend some disbelief, but he gets the job done. Mike Banning essentially symbolizes the ultimate American who is always ready to fight and won’t back down at any point.

Mike Banning doesn’t have much of a personality, but being an American basically is his personality. If the other guards had done as well as him, the film would have been finished a lot sooner. Even watching the pilots just stare at the giant cannon on the White House as it shot them down was just terrible. None of the other characters have much of a role except to panic or be destroyed. The film did give us a red herring as the President is shown to be practicing his boxing skills, but we never get to see him fight in the actual film. I would say that it was clever except that it’s just another way to make America look bad so I’m going to pass on that.

This film is fairly intense and violent, but you likely knew that going in. That being said, it’s not as intense as other films in this kind of genre and mostly you just need to remember that the characters are living out a Call of Duty game. It’s just like one of those titles as there are many headshots from both sides as well as the unassuming knife jabs. If you don’t like violence then you should probably stay away and the main character does have to resort intimidation, but I never said that he was a hero right? It’s a war and he goes all out on the opponents. It would be hard not to destroy everyone in this situation, but that’s the difference between a human fighting to save lives and a super hero. They go through the tough situations while still coming out scott clean because it’s what they do.

On the bright side, the pacing for the film is good. Something is always happening so there’s never a dull moment. Mike essentially starts his journey from the entrance of the White House all the way to the end through the movie. I forgot exactly how long it is, but you won’t really worry about the duration while you’re watching. The writing was also fairly decent although the traitor’s dialogue was not handled well and I didn’t buy his last second change of heart either. The whole scene just didn’t make any real sense.

Overall, This film is similar to Red Dawn in the sense that America looks bad and I’d say that it’s even worse because terrorists are behind the attack as opposed to another country. It does make a difference because the terrorists are simply given too much credit. It’s nice to see us mount a comeback at the end, but it doesn’t change the fact that they essentially destroyed all of our current government members during the process. There’s also a sequel on the way, which is likely going to make America look terrible once again. Less so since it isn’t on American soil, but shouldn’t someone find it a little strange that everyone will be in one place? There’s a reason why we have internet and such nowadays, it’s so all of the figure heads won’t have to meet up in one place. It’s not a parody like Sharknado so I guess we’ll just have to see how it ends up. I’m assuming that White House Down will be better as I thought that the trailer was good, but to an extent, I’m sure that it’ll be dicey. If you want to see a gritty action film where the main character goes around shooting everyone, I’d recommend Red. It would be more up your alley and it can basically match this film’s action scenes and holds up better in the other areas. Unless you’re waiting for the Call of Duty movie and want to see this one adapt the games (Because it is practically an adaption) this film just loses out to its rivals.

Overall 3/10